Featured Interview With Alice Berman
Tell us a little about yourself. Where were you raised? Where do you live now?
I grew up in Washington, DC, but I went to boarding school when I was fourteen, so I have a deep affinity for New England. I live in New York now, after five wonderful years in LA. My family has four dogs who I consider my own and love deeply! I'm a huge Agatha Christie fan (particularly Poirot) and have a deep love of the Harry Potter books, which I reread at least once a year.
At what age did you realize your fascination with books? When did you start writing?
I've loved books and reading for as long as I can remember; I used to ask my mother to keep reading me "Hitty: Her First Hundred Years," about a doll's journey in the US, over and over again. I usually spent my summer vacations just lounging with a book. I started writing when I was around 11, in the 5th grade. We were assigned to write a letter from the point of view of a Revolutionary War soldier, and that just set me off! I've been writing ever since.
Who are your favorite authors to read? What is your favorite genre to read. Who Inspires you in your writings?
I have kind of diverse taste; I love Agatha Christie, Tana French, and mysteries, but I also love Yuval Harari and Douglas Preston, who are nonfiction writers. I'll get on a tear and read only nonfiction and then switch to only fiction and then burn out and reread a book. I don't think I could say I have a favorite genre, but I absolutely find inspiration in anything I read, because human emotions are present whether you're reading Marilynne Robinson's "Housekeeping" or John Carreyrou's "Bad Blood," and I think that's the core of inspiration, at least for me. I've recently been rereading Mary McCarthy's work and I think she was an incredible writer.
Tell us a little about your latest book?
My latest book is literary fiction with the undercurrent of a mystery running throughout it. It focuses on six characters who are all in a bridal party together, which is such an unusual combination of meeting people and getting to know them for a brief period of time under intensely intimate circumstances. They go away for the weekend and, without giving too much away, a traumatic event occurs that really resonates with each one of them. They're from the world of "Gossip Girl" and "Succession," and the narrative with the six of them is not simply finding your footing in your late 20's, but also figuring out how they fit into this changing landscape of where they are on the socio-economic scale. In the meantime, you have a podcast reporter, Tyler, who is investigating the suicide of one of them (which you find out on page one: don't worry, I'm not spoiling anything!). He gets drawn deeper and deeper into the details around this death and into the thrall of this group of people and… drama ensues, to say the least!
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